This invention relates generally to a distributed printing system with a plurality of document processing subsystems and, more particularly, to a system which examines the attributes of a document for the purpose of delivering one or more portions of the document to one or more of the document processing subsystems on the basis of the examination of the attributes.
In accordance with a standard model of network printing, a job is developed at a workstation and delivered to a printer, by way of a server, for the purpose of executing the job. An example of such standard network printing modeling is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,493,634 to Bonk et al. (Issued: Feb. 20, 1996). This printing model is appropriate for those situations in which the printer is well suited for printing the job in accordance with certain criteria required by the system user. For example, if the user expects to have a selected number of prints generated within a certain time frame at a selected location, and such criteria is met at the printer, then the user is satisfied. If this criteria cannot be met, however, a certain degree of customer dissatisfaction may be ensured.
To avoid this sort of customer dissatisfaction, a distributed printing model of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,287,194 to Lobiondo ("Lobiondo") (Issued: Feb. 15, 1994) has been proposed. Lobiondo discloses a printshop management scheduling routine and system which provide optimum scheduling of print jobs on a network. The scheduling routine utilizes the total complex of printers available at a local location and/or remote locations to allocate and complete print jobs based on a plurality of criteria, including requested completion time for the project. If requested completion time does not allow printing of the print job by a sole printer, the print job is allocated to a plurality of available printers, each printing a portion of the complete print job.
Examples of "job type criteria" referred to in Lobiondo may include "selection of media format, size, number of copies, completion time, etc." Various systems suggest the advantage of splitting up a job and sending the resulting portions to a plurality of printers. In the October, 1995 edition of the Hardcopy Observer (published by Lyra Research, Inc.), at p. 15, a multiple printer arrangement, known as "MicroPress" is described, in part, as follows:
Like any spooler, PressDirector's "MicroSpool" spooler takes files in, stores them until the RIP is free and sends them on to the printer. But T/R systems has added many unique functions to MicorSpool, the primary purpose of which is to make multiple desktop color lasers act like a big laser. PA1 The key MicroSpool feature is called "electronic collation." After the software rasterizes a job, the resulting pages are stored as compressed bitmaps on the system's hard drive. Then a "parsing" process sends the pages out to the available engines in exactly the right sequence so that when the printing is done, the stacks produced by each engine can be placed on top of each other to create a complete multi-copy job with separator sheets inserted between copies. "The software looks at the job and parses it so that all four engines start and finish at the same time," says Daly. "It's very involved technically. There's a big, big algorithm." PA1 The product that Entire has developed is called the Image Manager. Conceptually, the Image Manager is very similar to the T/R Systems MicroPress (Observer October, 1995) which uses a PC-based server to drive multiple Canon desktop color laser engines as if they were a single high-speed virtual machine. The Entire technology does the same thing, except that it is designed to drive multiple HP LaserJet 5Si monochrone lasers.
A product similar to the above-described MicroPress is referred as follows in the December, 1995 edition of the Hardcopy Observer, at p. 69:
In contrast to the above-discussed model in which the job appears to be partitioned on the basis of at least one job level attribute, e.g. prints produced per unit time, a Xerox Disclosure Journal article to P. F. Morgan (vol. 16, No. 6, November/December 1991) entitled "Integration of Black Only and Color is Printers" contemplates an approach in which portions of a job, developed on the basis of page level information, are delivered to a plurality of printers. In particular, in the approach disclosed by Morgan, a job with black/white and color pages is provided. The job is separated on the basis of color so that the black/white part of the job is delivered to a black/white printing system and the color part of the job is delivered to a full process color machine. Preferably, color prints, corresponding with the color part of the job, are delivered to a sheet inserter so that the color prints can be inserted into a stream of black/white prints corresponding with the black/white part of the job.
It is readily understood by those skilled in the art of inserter design that combining insert sheets into a stream of prints requires a scheduling routing of the type disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,489,969 to Soler (Issued: Feb. 6, 1996). More particularly, the Soler patent, when read in conjunction with the Morgan disclosures teaches a system in which a job stream with "holes" or skipped pitches is developed by way of a suitable scheduling routine. In turn, it follows that sheets of ordered stock, such as sheets of a stack of color prints, would be insertable into the stream to accomplish one of the objects of the Morgan approach.
Various prior art teachings are believed to complement the approach disclosed by Morgan. For example, it is known that color can be achieved in printing with various color related systems. In one aspect of color reproduction, black/white prints are highlighted with color through use of tri-level xerography of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,078,929 to Gundlach (Issued Mar. 14, 1978). As disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,524,181 to Sung et al., it is understood that tri-level xerography can be implemented in a network printing environment. In another aspect of color reproduction, U.S. Pat. No. 5,373,350 to Taylor et al. (Issued Dec. 13, 1994) discloses a printer which combines technologies of xerographic and thermal ink jet printing into a single unit which is capable of producing prints with text and color graphics, i.e. accent colored prints.
Both the above-mentioned Lobiondo patent and the Morgan article directly or indirectly address the concept of classifying a job in accordance with one or more attributes of the job. Describing a job in terms of job level and/or page level attributes is considered, in some detail, by the disclosure of U.S. Pat. No. 5,181,162 to Smith et al. (Issued: Jan. 19, 1993). The Smith patent discloses an object oriented document management and production system in which documents are represented as collections of logical components or "objects" that may be combined and physically mapped into a page-by-page layout. Stored objects are organized, accessed and manipulated through a database management system.
The manipulation of objects or images with respect to one or more selected pages is further taught by U.S. Pat. No. 5,450,541 to Rourke et al. (Issued Sep. 12, 1995). The Rourke patent discloses a printing system in which an image, i.e. bitmap, can be laid out on an electronic page at a predesignated location and thereafter reproduced on a print at a location corresponding with the predesignated location at which it was set during layout. Preferably, the bitmap is obtained from a directory in mass memory of the printing system.
The concept of managing a job on the basis of its attributes is further disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,467,434 to Hower Jr. et al. (Issued: Nov. 14, 1995) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,450,571 to Rosekrans et al. (Issued: Sep. 12, 1995) Each of the Hower and Rosekrans patents illustrate systems which use servers having multiple queue capability. Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 5,129,639 to DeHority (Issued Jun. 14, 1992) discloses a system which permits interactive communication between a client and a server when the server is unable, because of an attribute mismatch, to fulfill the requirements of the client's job.
The advantage of using one or more queues in a printing process has been demonstrated by U.S. Pat. No. 4,947,345 to Paradise et al. (Issued Aug. 7, 1990). Paradise discloses a system in which copy/print jobs are delivered to an output queue which communicates with a printer while Fax jobs are delivered to a hold queue which communicates with the output queue. In practice, after a certain number of Fax jobs have accumulated in the hold queue, they are delivered to the output queue in such a manner that the Fax jobs are printed ahead of all jobs currently residing in the output queue.
It is believed that the criteria used to split a job in the Lobiondo patent is directed, in great part, toward job level information rather than page level information. It is further believed that all of the above-described systems in which multiple job portions are sent to multiple printers, except the system disclosed by the Morgan article, appear to teach away from partitioning a job into groups of noncontiguous pages since to do so would lead to problems in collation. Partitioning a job into groups of noncontiguous pages may be required, however, in situations where certain attributes recur sporatically throughout the job. For example, a job may comprise a book with chapters in which a merge item is to be applied at the beginning of each chapter.
While the Morgan article accommodates for partitioning of a job into groups on a noncontiguous basis, it teaches a sorting technique that is believed to be far less than optimum in that it requires sorting at a scanning device. This style of sorting not only requires dedicated hardware, but the time of an operator who is required to expend time in operating the scanning device. It would desirable to provide a system possessing the capability to comprehend the attributes of a job, at a suitable front end or server, and match the job with one or more document processing units based on such comprehension.
The present invention employs network capability to achieve various advantageous ends. The following discussion is intended to provide a background for any appropriate network implementation required by the disclosed embodiment below:
Examples of some recent patents relating to network environments of plural remote terminal shared users of networked printers include Xerox Corporation U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,243,518, 5,226,112, 5,170,340 and 5,287,194. Some patents on this subject by others include U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,113,355, 5,113,494 (originally filed Feb. 27, 1987), U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,181,162, 5,220,674, 5,247,670; 4,953,080 and 4,821,107. Further by way of background, some of the following Xerox Corporation U.S. patents also include examples of networked systems with printers: 5,153,577; 5,113,517; 5,072,412; 5,065,347; 5,008,853; 4,947,345; 4,939,507; 4,937,036; 4,920,481; 4,914,586; 4,899,136; 4,453,128; 4,063,220; 4,099,024; 3,958,088; 3,920,895; and 3,597,071. Also noted are IBM Corp. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,651,278 and 4,623,244, and Canon U.S. Pat. No. 4,760,458 and Japan. Pub. No. 59-63872 published Nov. 4, 1984. Some of these various above patents also disclose multi-functional or integral machines [digital scanner/facsimile/printer/copiers] and their controls.
Some other network system related publications include "Xerox Office Systems Technology" ". . . Xerox 8000 Series Products: Workstations, Services, Ethernet, and Software Development" .COPYRGT.1982, 1984 by Xerox Corporation, OSD-R8203A, Ed. T. Linden and E. Harslem, with a "Table of Contents" citing its numerous prior publications sources, and an Abstract noting the April 1981 announcement of "the 8110 Star Information System, A New Personal Computer . . . "; "Xerox System Integration Standard Printing Protocol XSIS 118404", April 1984; "Xerox Integrated Production Publishers Solutions: . . . " Booklet No. "610P50807" "November, 1985"; "Printing Protocol-Xerox System Integration Standard" .COPYRGT.1990 by Xerox Corporation, XNSS 119005 May 1990; "Xerox Network Systems Architecture", "General Information Manual", XNSG 068504 April 1985, with an extensive annotated bibliography, .COPYRGT.1985 by Xerox Corporation; "Interpress: The Source Book" , Simon & Schuster, Inc., New York, N.Y., 1988, by Harrington, S. J. and Buckley, R. R.; Adobe Systems Incorporated "PostScript.RTM. Language Reference Manual", Addison-Wesley Co., 1990; "Mastering Novell.RTM. Netware.RTM.", 1990, SYBEX, Inc., Alameda, Calif., by Cheryl E. Currid and Craig A. Gillett; "Palladium Print System" .COPYRGT.MIT 1984, et sec; "Athena85" "Computing in Higher Education: The Athena Experience", E. Balkovich, et al, Communications of the ACM, 28(11) pp. 1214-1224, November, 1985; and "Apollo87" "The Network Computing Architecture and System: An Environment for Developing Distributed Applications", T. H. Dineen, et al, Usenix Conference Proceedings, June 1987.
Noted regarding commercial network systems with printers and software therefor is the 1992 Xerox.RTM. Corporation "Network Publisher" version of the 1990 "DocuTech.RTM." publishing system, including the "Network Server" to customer's Novell.RTM. 3.11 networks, supporting various different network protocols and "Ethernet"; and the Interpress Electronic Printing Standard, Version 3.0, Xerox System Integration Standard XNSS 048601 (January 1986). Also, the much earlier Xerox.RTM. Corporation "9700 Electronic printing System"; the "VP Local Laser Printing" software application package, which, together with the Xerox.RTM. "4045" or other Laser Copier/Printer, the "6085" "Professional Computer System" using Xerox Corporation "ViewPoint" or "GlobalView.RTM." software and a "local printer [print service] Option" kit, comprises the "Documenter" system. The even earlier Xerox.RTM. Corporation "8000" "Xerox Network Services Product Descriptions" further describe other earlier Xerox.RTM. Corporation electronic document printing systems. Eastman Kodak "LionHeart.RTM." systems, first announced Sep. 13, 1990, are also noted.
Current popular commercial published "systems software" including LAN workstation connections includes Novell.RTM. DOS 7.0, "Windows.RTM." NT 3.1, and IBM OS/2 Version 2.1.
Disclosures of all of the patents cited and/or discussed above in this Background are incorporated herein by reference.